Our Thoughts and prayers are with the people of Sendai and all of those affected by the recent earthquake and tsunami this past year in Japan.

In July of 1999, J. Nichols, Dana Nichols and David Barron traveled to Japan, visiting Yakushima Island where 1/3 of all Japanese loggerhead sea turtles nest. Complimenting the existing research & story of the 'Loggerhead Transpacific Journey', we documented the nesting loggerhead turtles.
After Yakushima, we headed north east...more »

Our Thoughts and prayers are with the people of Sendai and all of those affected by the recent earthquake and tsunami this past year in Japan.

In July of 1999, J. Nichols, Dana Nichols and David Barron traveled to Japan, visiting Yakushima Island where 1/3 of all Japanese loggerhead sea turtles nest. Complimenting the existing research & story of the 'Loggerhead Transpacific Journey', we documented the nesting loggerhead turtles.
After Yakushima, we headed north east to Sendai looking for the place where Adelita, the first satellite tracked loggerhead turtle from Baja to Japan, came to shore. It was long believed by J. Nichols that Adelita was picked up by a fishing boat (most likely a squid boat) roughly 200 miles off the Japanese coast and brought to port near Sendia. Using a GPS and with the aide of local authorities, we journeyed along the coast until we found the exact position of landfall. After one large fishing port, and one smaller more likely location, we ended up at a third fishing port at Isohama, where we found exactly what J. Nichols had suspected. Roughly 10 Squid boats rested, on this rainy day, at port. This is were Adelita was brought.

The reason for the Japan trip was a result of research by J. Nichols and his colleagues Antonio Resendiz and Jeff Seminoff. They had proven that the newly hatched loggerhead turtles of Japan make their way across the pacific to Baja where they feed until maturity and then return to Japan in a ~ 10 month journey to nest. The journey back to Japan has been documented using satellite tags attached to loggerhead turtles, which has resulted in real time tracking of the loggerhead transpacific journey. The first of these turtles was 'Rosita and Adelita'.

School age children tracked the loggerheads journey using their computers in the classrooms. The course was plotted from the information sent to the satellites from the satellite tags on the turtles back as it made its journey.« less